Year C
 Acts 9:36-43
 Psalm 23
 Revelation 7:9-17
 John 10:22-30

May the words of my mouth O God…  speak your truth…

Light is a universal symbol of enlightenment…  it helps describe God’s Shekinah…  of God’s presence in feminine form…  which is embodied in so many mothers…  whose sacrifices for their families…  we honor today…  and lights and candles are used in several Western and Eastern religions…  Christmas…  Hanukkah…  Diwali…  Eid-al-Fitr…  and many of you know that when I was growing up… my family celebrated Hanukkah…  and when we lit the candles…  lighting them from the shamash…  or helper candle…  we said this prayer…

Blessed are you, Our God, Ruler of the Universe, who makes us holy through Your commandments; and commands us to enkindle the Hanukkah lights.

I liked Hanukkah…  it didn’t last longer than Christmastide…  back then I didn’t know about the Twelve Days of Christmas…  I mostly only knew about Christmas day…  Hanukkah lasted for eight days and eight nights…  and every night…  after the candles were lit…  my brother and I would get to open a small gift or two…  but there was one year…  when my aunt and uncle put up a Hanukkah bush…  well…  that’s what they called it…  a sliver tinsel tree…  with blue lights…  though some of us just called it their Jewish Christmas tree…

In Ch. 11:31 of the Book of Daniel…  which was written about 530 BCE…  the prophet told about a time of darkness…  foretold that the Second Temple would be desecrated…  and the regular offering would be abolished…  and more than 350 years later…  in 168 BCE…  Antiochus IV Epiphanes…  a Greek Hellenistic king…  desecrated the Temple’s altar by sacrificing a pig on it…  and by erecting a statute of Zeus in its most holy place…  and that desecration of the Temple was called…  the abomination of desolation… 

But then…  on the 25th of Kislev…  which corresponds to parts of November and December…  in the year 164 BCE…  Mattathias ben Johanan…  who was a Kohen…  a priest…  helped spark the Maccabean Revolt against Antiochus and his Empire…  led by Judas Maccabaeus and the Hasmoneans…   they were victorious…  and the Temple and its Jewish practices were restored…  and so The Festival of the Dedication referred to in our Gospel…   celebrates the re-dedication of the Temple…  and in fact…  the Hebrew word Hanukkah…  means dedication…

By Jesus’ day…  this festival was also called the Festival of Lights…  it could have gotten this name from the fact that at the re-dedication of the Temple…  the Lampstand…  which in Exodus 25:31-31…  God instructed Moses to make…  gave light in the Temple for the first time in years…  and Josephus…  a Jewish historian and contemporary of Jesus…  wrote that the Festival was called Lights…  because…  he wrote…  the right to worship ‘came to light’ for us…  at a time when we hardly dared hope for it… 

But another tradition which may have already been around in Jesus’ day…  and the one with which I grew up…  said that when the Hasmoneans were restoring the Temple…  they could find only one flask of undefiled oil that had been in the safekeeping of the high priest… . and it contained only enough oil to keep the Temple Lampstand burning for one day…  but somehow…  miraculously…  the oil kept it burning for eight days…

And while it’s spring here in western Michigan…  it’s winter in the Gospel…  two months have passed since Jesus’ confrontation with the Jews at the Feast of Tabernacles in October (John 7:2)…  and the weather was inclement… now most Greek temples had covered porches to provide shelter for people gathering to worship…  and a portico was also one way a city could display its wealth… and in Acts 3:11 and 5:12…  Luke reports…  that Peter regularly taught and sometimes healed…  at Solomon’s Portico…  which again…  according to Josephus…  was a double-columned porch on the east side of the Temple which provided this shelter…  about 600 feet long…  and about 23 feet wide…  with white marble columns about 40 feet tall…  and with cedar-panels for a ceiling…  this portico would have been impressive…

And throughout the Festival of Lights…  Temple worship would have included various readings from Numbers…  Zechariah…  and the Psalms…  but the climax to the reading from Numbers that Jesus and the Jews would have heard…  is Numbers 7:89…  which says…  When Moses went into the tent of meeting to speak with the LORD…  from above the mercy seat on the Ark of the Covenant…  he would hear God’s voice speaking to him… 

When my former wife was pregnant with our daughter…  we heard through La Leche League…  about the importance of communicating with her in utero…  about the importance of speaking to her…  telling her stories…  playing music for her…  telling her that she was already our beloved…  to let her know that she’d be welcomed into a life outside of her current world…  and it was easier for me to create this kind of intimacy…  to get my face closer to hers…  in a small way…  I had called her my own…  and in the hospital nursery…  right after she was born…  the very first time she heard me speak…  she effortlessly turned her head in the direction of my voice…  she knew it’s sound…  she knew who I was…

Some of you will remember that today is Good Shepherd Sunday…  the fourth Sunday of Easter is always Good Shepherd Sunday…  and the Gospel lesson in all three years is from John…  and always about sheep…  and how the shepherd cares for and protects them…  and how they know the shepherd’s voice…

And today…  Jesus says the Jews would know he’s the Messiah if they would only hear his voice…  and not just external hearing…  but inward hearing and digesting…  Jesus’ Word is God’s Word…  and if they’d only listen to him with the ear of their hearts…  they’d have fellowship with God…  if they’d only listen to him…  they could each be a Moses…  and as Jeremiah prophesied…  God would put God’s Law within them…  and write it on their hearts…

And Jesus reassures us…  that his hand…  is God’s hand…  and no one will be able to snatch us out of God’s hand…  but there are many different shepherds…  who all want us to listen to and follow their voices…  and as Jesus says earlier in John’s Gospel…  some of them are thieves and bandits…  who don’t enter through the gate…  but climb in in other ways…  and some of them are hired hands who run away when the wolf…  a word used in scripture to indicate treachery and cruelty…  comes…  and tries to snatch us out of God’s hand…  away from God’s Word…

And now…  the incarnate Word…  the new Temple…  is walking in the old Temple…  and those gathered around him could not see far enough past his words and actions…  to understand that what he said and did…  was said and done in the Father’s name…  Jesus was established in silence…  and every time we remain silent long enough…  we can hear God call us above the din of the other shepherds…  every time we plant the seeds of God’s Word in good soil…  every time we repent…  turn back to God…  what we are doing…  is rededicating our lives and ourselves to God…  what we are doing…  is enkindling God’s light with in us and becoming God’s Lampstand…  Jesus is the Good Shepherd…  who calls to us…  over and over again…  and it’s never too late to listen with the ears of our hearts…  because when we do…  we will recognize…  that is re-cognize…  ourselves as his own…  and our heads will turn effortlessly…  in the direction of his voice…  because he already calls each one of us… his beloved…